Essentials nostalgia - the death of martial healing

[Mouseferatu]

AFAIAC, an exception that dramatic--"temporary HP from martial healers stack"--is extreme enough that (depending on how its written), it basically either qualifies as a rewrite, or gets complex enough as to not be worthwhile.

See, as soon as you make a rule like that, you have to start tracking two separate categories of temp HP. Warlord temp HP stack, but others don't. Do they stack with each other? Which ones go away? Which ones become permanent? Which ones get lost first? After all, if some are going to stack or possibly become permanent, you want to save those and lose them after the ones that don't, right?

It's absolutely not worth it.

 

[noodle fish mice]

If you have a problem with martial healing, why don't you just disallow the warlord from your game and let the rest of us enjoy ourselves? And how is the warlord's ability to heal any less realistic than the warlord's OTHER abilities, which can pull of some pretty crazy stuff? Why aren't you complaining about, say, Lead the Attack, for example? And that's only off the top of my head - it's hardly a warlord's least "realistic" option.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

AFAIAC, an exception that dramatic--"temporary HP from martial healers stack"--is extreme enough that (depending on how its written), it basically either qualifies as a rewrite, or gets complex enough as to not be worthwhile.

See, as soon as you make a rule like that, you have to start tracking two separate categories of temp HP. Warlord temp HP stack, but others don't. Do they stack with each other? Which ones go away? Which ones become permanent? Which ones get lost first? After all, if some are going to stack or possibly become permanent, you want to save those and lose them after the ones that don't, right?

It's absolutely not worth it.

Exactly. Remember all the confusion people had just with BRV fighters when they came out? It was a big hairball. K.I.S.S. is the operating principle here.

And really KD, you're just hanging onto a view of things that's not really justified. Sure, HP damage CAN represent real physical damage and to some extent does, but people use grit and determination to ignore and overcome physical damage all the time. It's one of the most heroic sorts of things people routinely do.

So it looks like this, the fighter gets bashed by the ogre's club and goes down. Now, he's 'unconscious', but what does that really mean? The fighter is down on the ground and helpless. He can't take actions. That doesn't mean he's actually out like a light. It means he's unable to stand and unable to act. He could just be rolling around on the ground in sheer agony or so stunned that he can't do anything. He's making death saves, if left to his own devices he MIGHT die. Still, he's not that bad off because someone could spend a minor action to trigger his HS and he'll get up again. Nothing about that suggests that its impossible for the Warlord to inspire him to get back up. You don't have to resort to mysticism to explain it.

One of the things this 'it must be magical healing' theory is resting on is a failure to understand the concept of narrative in 4e. The fighter can be roused with words BECAUSE THE WARLORD DID IT. The player of the warlord when he uses his Inspiring Word has narrative control over the story, he's allowed to determine what the state of the world actually IS within the mechanical limits of his powers. This is the key difference between the simulationist concept of 3.x where the world is a certain way and the players just react to it. In 4e they DECIDE what the world is like, they make it, they are full participants in how the game world reality and narrative work.

 

[Gradine]

It's been said enough times already, but yeah, HP is abstract. 4e is probably the first version of the game to really give that concept credence mechanically. The only problem with Inspiring Word isn't that it's Martial... it's that it's nothing but a re-skinned Healing Word.

 

[Gradine]

Lots of problems with this as already mentioned. In addition, it's an Immediate Reaction, so it would bring the prone unconscious PC back up, defeating the purpose of what you wrote.

As has been masterfully pointed out by AbdulAlhazred, the players write the flavor for their own effect. An immediate reaction is the only effect I can think of that allows the Warlord to bring back an unconscious player back on their feet without breaking anyone's precious verisimilitude. For instance:

A ferocious Orc catches Alice the Fighter in side his mighty waraxe, dropping Alice to her knees. Just before her world turns to black, she hears the voice of Bob of Warlord, shouting for her to stay conscious. This brings her back with renewed vigor, and on her next turn she can stand back up on cleave the Orc in two.

As has already been pointed out, a healer needs to be able to bring unconscious characters back on their feet. The immediate reaction makes the warlord able (nay, required) to bring an "unconscious" character back up while they still have some semblance of consciousness left.

Warlord gets dazed: fail (This is the most important fail)
Warlord wants to heal himself (on his turn): fail (No self healing...bad)
Warlord wants to heal someone before they go further down to prevent boodied: fail

I personally don't mind martial healing. I personally don't think the martial healer must be craptastic in the healing department.

The lack of self-healing was an easily solved oversight on my part (in fact I've done just that). I don't entirely understand your third point. If an attack makes a character bloodied, you immediately heal it and viola, they're no longer bloodied, unless the attack in question was particularly powerful (in which case they'd need two heals from another healer anyway). But no other healer is fixing the "bloodied" condition nearly as quickly (indeed, before any other monsters would have acted), making this a strength in the power's favor, not a weakness.

The lack of healing on the Warlord's turn was entirely intentional on my part; I think this restriction meshes with the flavor of the Warlord quite well. The Warlord, more than any other Leader, must carefully monitor the situation within his or her party at all times. After all, other leaders get to use to actual magic to restore someone's wounds; Warlords don't have that luxury. This of course means that if anyone goes down outside the Warlord's range they stay down, but this will encourage our Martial Healer to keep within a good distance with their allies (which they should be doing anyway) and invest in Heal skill. I don't entirely buy that Warlords should be the best healers or even quite as versatile of healers as others, but they should be the quickest healers.

There are other perks to being quicker that you've missed as well. The best of those is that Alice the Fighter doesn't actually spend any time unconscious. This means no coup-de-graces, and probably even better, if Alice goes before Bob she doesn't have to wait a turn, and potentially rack up a failed death save. No other healer would be able to boast that (At least not with their basic healing power).

Daze is the only issue with the power you bring up that I hadn't foreseen (I had figured there'd be at least one.) Daze isn't exactly a walk in the park for other healers (and if the character they're trying to heal is out of range, forget it) but that can be a bit crippling for the Warlord besides (especially since they can't solve unconscious after the fact.)

I've edited my old post with an attempt to solve this. It might be a bit too good, but I assume this is balanced by the fact that you can't use it on your own turn. Reprinted here:
"Special: You may use this power even if you are otherwise unable to take immediate actions. If you are restricted to taking a single action per round, then this power counts as your one action."

Probably could be worded a bit better, and probably makes the Warlord a bit too rules fiddly, but it would be nice to see an Inspiring Word that is more than just Martial Healing Word.

 

[Markn]

See, as soon as you make a rule like that, you have to start tracking two separate categories of temp HP. Warlord temp HP stack, but others don't. Do they stack with each other? Which ones go away? Which ones become permanent? Which ones get lost first? After all, if some are going to stack or possibly become permanent, you want to save those and lose them after the ones that don't, right?

It's absolutely not worth it.

This is a fair point. As I mentioned those were just some ideas off the top of my head.

As an aside, since I jumped in kind of late, I should point out that I am not against martial healing. I just would have liked each of the leader classes to offer healing differently so as to provide more interesting options in leader choices. It's mostly a flavor thing for me that I think would make the game better. Obviously, everyone has their opinion on this.

Having said that though, I am absolutely positive there ARE elegant ways to solve the issue. If its done right, it wouldn't need to be much more complex than say a Fighters Mark vs a Paladins Divine Challenge. It could even be as simple as each leader having a potent range of healing. Forex, leader is best at healing when an ally has a dying condition, warlord when an ally is bloodied, etc. etc.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Is it really impossible to remember that magic missile was 2d4+intelligence modifier force damage. This goes up to 4d4+intelligence modifier damage at 21st level.

There you go, simple as can be.

No, that's not asking too much.

But the point isn't that it can't be remembered or written down, it is that it has been permanently rewritten in CB (not a change everyone likes) and WotC could do that with any aspect of the game they so choose.

IOW, if they can rewrite MM to be autohit for less damage in CB, they can also rewrite the Warlord in CB to have no martial healing.

Now, this may not matter in a group that has the books on hand, but if someone comes to the group as a newbie post a rewrite and uses only the DDI & CB, he won't have access to the original version of the Warlord.

 

[renau1g]

But that fear of Wotc changing anything isn't limited to martial healing. If once Essentials is released Wizards changes their stance and says you know what, we're keeping these classes as core, and all the PHB classes are now errata'd to be more like their classical counterparts, we'd be forced to accept the update, or not update the CB. Just because the can do something doesn't mean they are likely to do it. Just like they won't nerf twin strike, despite it being far and away the most powerful at-will in the game, it's a pretty ingrained part, unlike the fringe spell Magic Missile, Martial Healing (through the warlord) are one of the most popular leaders in the game. I really dont' see that happening.

I really fail to see the problem with this, to me its really not much difference than second wind, should people only get THP's with second wind then? What about when someone takes the action to activate the second wind on a dying PC? How is it that they can jump back up in the blink of an eye, fighting at full combat efficiency when just a second ago they were slipping to death's door? Must be mysticism, but wait, joe the ranger just healed him... weird...

 

[Black Knight Irios]

joe the ranger just healed him... weird...

What Joe the ranger can heal - I always thought only Texas Ranger Walker could heal by Laying on Hands - that totally ruins my game!


Some people believe martial healing should be "weaker" than magical healing b/c you can do magic, you can have anything that you desire. If I think about that further that leads to:
a) martial defenders have to be weaker - magic can do it better
b) martial strikers must do less damage - b/c magic is omnipotent
c) martial controllers don't work - oh lol there is no martial controller, magic wins
d) martial leaders are bad healers - magic heals/buffs/enables by far better

Actually we should have learned something from previous editions. Magic > all sucks. At least for all those that are not on team-magic.

IMHO, every leader should be able to fulfill the basic healing needs of a party - the various 2/encounter minor action heals do that nicely. The remaining abilities can be very specific and different by class.

There is no logical reason ingame for the balance of power between the martial power source and the other power sources. But the balance is there that those that want to play a martial character feel useful in comparison to the others.

 

[KarinsDad]

As has already been pointed out, a healer needs to be able to bring unconscious characters back on their feet.

But, that's the point.

What makes an inspiring leader a healer? It's one thing to inspire. It's another to heal. Unlike mundane activities like climbing and running and fighting, healing should be magic. It's outside the realm of real world plausible, hence, it should be magical, mystical, or supernatural. Especially at first level. Having super Ki martial powers like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon is fine for Epic levels, not so much for first level.

Each person can have their own opinion on this without being "wrong". The martial power source is as much mystical as it is mundane because all PCs have superpowers.

As Syndrome said: "Everyone can be super! And when everyone's super, [laughs maniacally] no one will be."